VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 isn’t just a product update; it’s a defining leap forward.
What started as a bundled stack is now a full-spectrum private cloud platform, built for traditional workloads, modern apps, and enterprise AI. With cost-saving innovations, native automation, and built-in AI support, VCF 9.0 sets a new bar for private cloud agility and scale. This is the most significant release in VCF’s history, and here’s why. From Products to Platform: Why It Matters
For years, VMware customers juggled multiple management planes across vSphere, vSAN, NSX, Aria, and Kubernetes tooling. VCF 9.0 eliminates that sprawl by bringing everything into two unified consoles:
Benefit: You save time, reduce human error, and boost team efficiency by managing everything—from deployment to decommission—through a single, cohesive interface.
What’s New in VCF 9.0—and Why It MattersVMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 introduces powerful new features that enhance infrastructure performance, security, and operational efficiency. Here's a breakdown of what’s new and the real-world impact:
0 Comments
Introduction: Beyond the Prompt
The era of single-turn prompts is over. Enterprise AI teams are now building agentic applications—software that can reason, remember, and act over multiple steps using tools, memory, and context.
But while public cloud tools like LangChain and open-source agent runtimes are popular for prototyping, they rarely meet enterprise standards for security, observability, and operational control. Enter VMware Tanzu and Spring AI 1.0: a fully integrated, production-ready framework for deploying agentic AI workflows on a secure Kubernetes platform, backed by VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF). What Makes an App "Agentic"?
Agentic apps move beyond simple LLM queries. They:
VMware’s Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an emerging framework designed to standardize how AI agents manage and retrieve context across tools like vector databases, LLMs, and business APIs. Together with the Spring AI SDK, MCP allows developers to orchestrate multi-step agentic workflows using familiar Java patterns—delivered securely and observably via Tanzu Platform. The cloud revolution promised agility, scalability, and cost savings. For many organizations, adopting a "cloud-first" strategy seemed like the clear path forward. But in 2025, we are witnessing a dramatic shift. CIOs and enterprise architects across industries are embracing a new approach: the "cloud-smart" strategy. Based on real-world lessons, emerging industry surveys, and the evolving demands of AI, security, and cost control, the cloud-smart philosophy is reshaping how we think about digital infrastructure. From Cloud-First to Cloud-Smart: What CIOs Are Learning from Real-World Deployments From Cloud-First to Cloud-SmartA cloud-first strategy emphasizes default deployment of new workloads to public cloud environments. It favors speed and scale, but often lacks nuanced workload placement, governance, and long-term cost analysis. The result? Cloud sprawl, ballooning costs, compliance headaches, latency challenges, and vendor lock-in.
In contrast, a cloud-smart approach takes a more deliberate path. It asks: "What is the right environment for this workload?" Whether it's public cloud, private cloud, hybrid, or edge, cloud-smart thinking evaluates placement based on security, performance, budget, compliance, and data sovereignty. This approach doesn't reject public cloud—it incorporates it as one option in a diversified portfolio that aligns better with business priorities. Artificial Intelligence is quickly becoming a staple in every industry—from personalized customer service to autonomous vehicles. But behind the sleek models and intelligent applications lies a critical ingredient: NVIDIA. Just like cocoa beans are essential to making chocolate—regardless of whether it's milk, dark, or white—NVIDIA’s technology is the raw ingredient fueling AI across every major platform. Whether it’s Microsoft’s Copilot, VMware’s Private AI Foundation, or Hugging Face’s model training stack, chances are, NVIDIA is at the core. The Hardware Layer: From Beans to SiliconNVIDIA's GPUs are the silicon equivalent of cocoa beans—raw, potent, and necessary for transformation. Products like the A100, H100, and the Grace Hopper Superchips provide the computational horsepower to train and deploy large AI models. The DGX systems and NVIDIA-certified infrastructure are the AI factories, grinding and refining data into actionable intelligence.
These systems are foundational in hyperscale cloud environments and enterprise data centers alike. Whether you’re processing video analytics in a smart city deployment or training a custom LLM for financial modeling, it all starts here. NVIDIA hardware is often the first ingredient sourced in any serious AI recipe. Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 10 is a major leap forward for enterprise IT. With modern infrastructure demands, hybrid cloud growth, and the emergence of AI and quantum computing, Red Hat has taken a bold approach with RHEL 10—bringing in container-native workflows, generative AI, enhanced security, and intelligent automation. If you’re a systems engineer, architect, or infrastructure lead, this release deserves your full attention. Here’s what makes RHEL 10 a milestone in the evolution of enterprise Linux. Image Mode Goes GA: Container-Native System ManagementImage Mode, first introduced as a tech preview in RHEL 9.4, is now generally available (GA) in RHEL 10—and it's one of the most impactful changes in how you build and manage Linux systems.
Rather than managing systems through traditional package-by-package installations, Image Mode enables you to define your entire system declaratively using bootc, similar to how you build Docker containers. As generative AI (GenAI) revolutionizes industries with tools like ChatGPT, Falcon, and MPT, enterprises are asking the big question: How do we embrace AI innovation without compromising data security or compliance? Enter VMware Private AI — a purpose-built framework to bring GenAI safely into enterprise data centers. This post breaks down VMware’s reference architecture for deploying LLMs using VMware Cloud Foundation, Tanzu Kubernetes Grid, and NVIDIA AI Enterprise. Whether you're building AI chatbots or fine-tuning foundation models, VMware Private AI equips your infrastructure for secure, scalable innovation. Why On-Premises GenAI?At Dell Technologies World 2025, one of the standout sessions focused on a rapidly evolving frontier: how modern network fabrics are being reimagined to meet the demands of AI and cloud workloads. With panelists representing leading innovators across enterprise networking, AI infrastructure, and cloud-scale computing, the session offered a rare peek into the architectural choices, operational challenges, and future trajectories of next-gen networking. Here are some of the key insights that emerged from the conversation: AI Workloads Are Reshaping Network FundamentalsAI is no longer just a buzzword — it’s dictating how networks are designed. Traditional Ethernet is still the backbone, but as one speaker put it: “It’s Ethernet, but it’s not.” AI training clusters demand lossless, RDMA-like behavior, forcing networking teams to rethink congestion management, traffic patterns, and throughput optimization.
Key Challenge: Achieving high-throughput, low-latency, and lossless performance — all at once. Solution Trends:
The energy at Dell Technologies World 2025 was electric—fitting, considering the opening keynote made one thing unmistakably clear: AI is now the world’s most powerful utility. Dell is not just embracing the AI revolution—they’re enabling it, scaling it, and humanizing it. Held at what Dell calls “Dell Technologies Way”, the keynote welcomed us into a vision of interconnected innovation, where data becomes action and AI becomes accessible to all. Key Themes From the KeynoteAI at the Edge: Real-Time Intelligence, AnywhereDell emphasized that 75% of enterprise data will soon be created and processed outside traditional data centers. This shift makes edge computing—real-time processing at or near the source--essential for delivering low-latency, high-impact AI insights.
From smart cities to retail floors, Dell’s rugged servers and edge-optimized AI PCs are transforming how decisions are made. Lowe’s, for example, is deploying AI-infused micro data centers inside stores to power computer vision and real-time customer assistance. The edge isn’t a buzzword anymore—it’s where AI lives and breathes. As enterprises continue to embrace hybrid and multi-cloud strategies, VMware's partnerships with leading cloud providers have opened the door for seamless workload migrations and modernized IT infrastructures. Two prominent VMware-based cloud solutions available today are Azure VMware Solution (AVS) and Google Cloud VMware Engine (GCVE). Both platforms offer robust VMware environments hosted natively in their respective clouds, but key differences in capabilities, pricing, and integration make each suitable for different scenarios. Let's explore and compare these two powerful VMware cloud services. Overview of Azure VMware Solution (AVS)Azure VMware Solution (AVS) is a fully managed VMware environment directly integrated into the Microsoft Azure ecosystem. It enables organizations to extend or migrate their existing VMware workloads to Azure with minimal re-architecture.
Key Features:
As more of my customers embrace the transformative potential of artificial intelligence, the demand for robust, secure, and scalable AI infrastructure has surged. Nutanix has taken a pivotal role in addressing these needs with its GPT-in-a-Box 2.0 solution, an enterprise-ready, full-stack AI platform tailored for organizations that require secure, on-premises AI deployments. This offering streamlines AI adoption by providing a comprehensive ecosystem, optimized infrastructure, and extensive partner support, allowing businesses to deploy and manage AI applications at scale. Simplified AI Deployment with GPT-in-a-BoxNutanix’s GPT-in-a-Box simplifies the deployment, operation, and scaling of AI workloads. With its 2.0 iteration, the solution includes an integrated inference endpoint and end-to-end features, such as GPU and CPU certification, high-performance storage, Kubernetes management, and in-depth telemetry. This design allows organizations to leverage generative AI (GenAI) models like LLMs on-premises, providing control over data security and operational flexibility.
GPT-in-a-Box is particularly beneficial for industries with stringent data regulations, such as government and finance, where public cloud alternatives may not meet compliance requirements. By extending Nutanix’s hybrid infrastructure strengths to AI, organizations can now manage AI applications with the same control and resilience they expect from their existing IT environments. |